Just Can't Get It Right

I have not had many blogs about restaurants lately. The reasons is, I don't like to have negative posts. I will call it what it is, but I like to write about great experiences, not bad. I do have another criteria. I will not write anything negative about a restaurant that we know the owner, or write negatively about a restaurant where someone takes us out to dinner.

So, all that to say, other than our super regular restaurants, there has not been much great to write about lately.

Friday night, we decided to go to a favorite spot in Dallas. Every time we have been there, the food is excellent. We had a great table on the patio by the main street. Lots of fun to watch the people go buy. The waiter was average, but the food . . . . terrible. If that had been my first time, I would never go back. I decided to order the special instead of sticking to my regular favorite. Pops had my favorite. The special was fried chicken with potato salad. (If I was on death row, that would be my last meal.)

Pops stroganoff tasted like it was burned and had been salvaged with some vinegar. On the friend chicken front, if you can't compare to Babe's, don't even try. The potato salad had truffle oil on it. There are very few things I don't like, but I have learned lately, to stay away from truffle oil. The first bite is good, but after the third, it is sickenly rich. The chicken was marginal at best.

We didn't even try dessert. We decided to cut our losses with the meal.

So last night, we were hoping for a better experience. We went to La Joya in Las Colinas. We usually go there about once a month. We know a couple of servers and recognize the staff. Not last night. It looked like a whole different crew. There were more staff than customers and the staff spent the majority of their evening drinking at the bar.

To start off with, the bartender came to our table to take our drink order. I said water. He said margarita, beer or wine? I said Dr. Pepper. He looked at Pops and said, margarita, beer or wine? Pops said Dr. Pepper. He then chastised us for not getting a margarita. He said, what is wrong with you?

After a long wait, we ordered an appetizer and our meal. They all came out at the same time. The waitress never came back. Finally after about 30 minutes she took Pops plate and I asked for a to-go container. She didn't come back for another 15 minutes. We ordered our favorite dessert. It came out with no ice cream or almonds (our favorite part). We had to flag her down and wait another 30 minutes for our check. In the mean time, she and the bartender were yelling at each other in Spanish all night in between customers (all 4 tables of them).

The check was then another joke. The computer was down and she had to come back and ask us what we had. She hand wrote a ticket and did not add correctly. She was huffing and puffing and yelling in Spanish the entire time.

So, if we could have gotten Friday's atmosphere and service mixed with Saturday's food, it would have been perfect.

This Week In Pictures

We have had a great week. Leasha and Geoffrey got married on Saturday.

Landrie started Kindergarten.

Karsyn has been very busy working.

Celebration At Celebrity

If you have read my blog for anytime at all, you will know that one of my favorite places to eat lunch is Celebrity Bakery in Colleyville. It has been one of my favorites since it opened over 5 years ago. I always go at least a couple of times a week, and usually more. My favorite item on the menu is the Cranberry Chicken Salad.

Celebrity recently had a contest to name local celebrities for their volunteer work in the community. My wonderful friend Kathy, who by the way is an awesome writer, sent in a letter and I won. I feel quite certain that it is her writing skills that sealed the deal.

On August 15th, I was honored at a party with 3 other local celebrities. They had a great party with lots of wonderful food. My great family and friends showed up for the celebration.


Now for the best part. Besides the party, I have won another party that will be a VIP Baking Experience. And, for the next year, the Cranberry Chicken Salad will be named after me.

If you have a chance, go to Celebrity and try it. You won’t be disappointed. And you also need to order some Vanilla Thumbprints for dessert.

New Blog In Town

One of my greatest blessings in life is my family. We are so fortunate to have all of our family within a 15 minute drive, some even closer. I have a brother and a sister. My brother has two girls and my sister has 5 kids. They are all about the same age as my kids.

My kids have grown up with their cousins, just like they are brothers and sisters. Some of them were even roomates in college.

My niece Whitney has always been very crafty. She is now rubbing off on Ashley and Kyndra. Jennifer joins then quite often and they are always making fun stuff.

Ashley and Whitney have started their own blog, Shanty 2 Chic, where they have all of their great finds and how they turned them into gold. Check it out. Really cute. Way to go girls!

A Recipe You HAVE To Try

I have started back keeping the girls this week since Jennifer and Lamar have gone back to school. Yesterday, I took the girls over to their house in the afternoon. It was maid day at my house and my rule is that I like to keep it clean for at least 24 hours.

As we were getting out of the car, Landrie told me about this salad that she wanted to make. I thought that was a little weird, because she wouldn't touch any salad. I got Karsyn down for a nap and then Landrie sat down with me and told me all about her salad. I got some paper and wrote the recipe down. She was as serious as she could be.

Come to find out, she had done the same thing to Jennifer the week before and she had gotten out a huge glass bowl and some of the ingredients. I told her we might need to wait a little bit and go to the store, and she assured me we had all the ingredients and proceeded to show me where they all were, including the huge glass bowl. So here it is, all in her words.

Pickle Peanut Butter Salad

2 batches of water
peanut butter
jelly
lemonade
pickles (Mommy can throw them out if she doesn't like them)
cherry candy
bread (for the birds)
chili chips
ketchup

You start by putting the chips in the bottom of the bowl.

And most important, she told me to be sure and take the recipe to my Book Club.

Oh, I love this girl!